Yahoo Lifestyle Secret Invasion’s Polarizing Rhodey Reveal Could Be Worth It, Says Don Cheadle — If Armor Wars Happens
The following contains spoilers from the Disney+/Marvel series Secret Invasion.
How Don Cheadle ultimately feels about that polarizing Secret Invasion reveal is… yet to be determined.
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(Loosely) based on the 2008 Marvel comic of the same name, Secret Invasion streamed on Disney+ in summer 2023 and followed a rebel faction of shapeshifting Skrulls who’d been infiltrating all aspects of life on Earth for years.
Midway through the Marvel series’ eight-episode run, viewers learned that presidential envoy James “Rhodey” Rhodes was in fact a Skrull named Raava.
But for how long had Rhodey not been Rhodey?
In the Secret Invasion finale, Talos’ daughter G’iah (Emilia Clarke) dashed into the rebels’ New Skrullos facility to free the humans who’d been strapped into fracking pods for the purpose of being “duplicated.” Everett Ross (whose Skrull imposter was revealed in the series premiere), once “awakened,” turned to the real Rhodey on his right and asked, “Colonel Rhodes…? How long have you been here?”
Rhodey tried to step out of his own fracking pod but teetered. “Whoa! Colonel Rhodes, I’ve got you,” said G’iah, rushing to catch him. “You’ve been held hostage, for a long time.”
Given Rhodey’s wobbliness and the fact that he was wearing a hospital gown — presumably from when he was paralyzed during Captain America: Civil War‘s tarmac fight — it’s possible that we’d been looking at Skrull Rhodey for multiple MCU movies including Avengers: Endgame, plus those 95 seconds in TV’s Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
When speaking with Cheadle on Thursday night about Peacock’s Fight Night miniseries, TVLine was sure to check in on the status of Marvel’s Armor Wars, which was announced as a six-episode, Cheadle-centric Disney+ series back in December 2020, but as of September 2022 was said to be re-conceived as a feature film.
Cheadle’s Armor Wars status report, as well as his take on that Secret Invasion reveal, is best presented as a Q&A excerpt:
TVLINE | Any word on where Armor Wars stands?
You can find out and let me know.
TVLINE | Last I heard, it switched from being a TV series to a movie, but there have been no updates since.
Yeah. I think the word that’s the most salient in that sentence is “switched.” [Laughs] I don’t know, I’m not sure where anything is right now. I think things are going through a lot of changes, and we’ll see what happens, we’ll see what it is.
TVLINE | Well, I sure hope it happens for you, because it’d be sad if the last Rhodey we spent meaningful time with was actually not Rhodey!
Yeah, no s–t.
TVLINE | What was your reaction when you were first told that you’d be playing a Skrull Rhodey for almost all of Secret Invasion?
Uh… you know, there was no… it wasn’t a demand. It was a request. “What do you think about playing this?” And it was to set up stuff in the following thing. So, if the following thing happens, and all those things were set up, then that’s one thing. If, as you said, it doesn’t, then we can talk about how I feel about it after!
Want scoop on any Marvel TV show ? Shoot an email to InsideLine@tvline.com, and your question may be answered via Matt’s Inside Line!
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